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Malicious Plusnet Employee Cut Me Off

javaexpert
Newbie
Posts: 3
Registered: ‎05-07-2013

Malicious Plusnet Employee Cut Me Off

I am typing this on my mobile phone as yesterday afternoon a malicious Plusnet employee cut  off my phone AND broadband.
Yesterday afternoon, I got a call from someone asking for me by name. As I work from home, I answered the call saying "You're through to sales".  He then asked to speak to me, I told him I was the person he was looking for, and he told me he was from Plusnet.
He then said, "Are you at work?", to which I responded, "Yes. I am working. What's it about? I saw by my bank statement that you've had my direct debit this month".
He said, "I can't talk about anything as I've not gone through data protection"
I said, "Can you call me after 6?"
He said, "I'll send you an email"
I said, "Which email address are you sending it to".
He said, "The one registered on the system"
I said, "Can you tell me which one that is, I've got about 10 of them.
He said, "I can't tell you that, I've not gone through data protection".
Because I was waiting for UPS's tracer service to call me back over a lost international shipment that one of my customers was angry about, I said, "Ok, I'm working now. Goodbye".
About an hour later when I went to make an outbound call, I discovered I'd been cut off.  Calls were re-routed to Plusnet and I discovered that the guy who called wanted to talk about the first instalment of a payment plan I agreed to when I made a series of emergency directory enquiry calls to find out the numbers of my electricity company and the national grid and the managing agents after I heard fizzing coming from the fuse box and I couldn't get on the Internet to find these.  It took my usual £24 bill to around £100
I asked him to call me back in a little over two hours and he cut me off. And as he was so precise about data protection, why was he happy to assume that he was talking to the person he asked for ?
Clearly this was simply malicious. When I called in I asked for his manager to listen to the call so that they could see his immediate action was totally unwarranted. I asked to be called back when this had been done. That was 5.20pm yesterday.  
As of 9.21am this morning I've had no call back. I've no Internet to answer customer queries that come through the company email (scrolling the custom email interface does not work on my mobile) I can't print any shipping labels so customers cannot have their orders sent. I can't make customer call backs. And no manager has been bothered to contact me. Great Plusnet.  "Good" "Honest" service !
6 REPLIES 6
jelv
Seasoned Hero
Posts: 26,785
Thanks: 971
Fixes: 10
Registered: ‎10-04-2007

Re: Malicious Plusnet Employee Cut Me Off

My first reaction is to wonder if this actually was a call from Plusnet or if it was a scammer!
jelv (a.k.a Spoon Whittler)
   Why I have left Plusnet (warning: long post!)   
Broadband: Andrews & Arnold Home::1 (FTTC 80/20)
Line rental: Pulse 8 Home Line Rental (£14.40/month)
Mobile: iD mobile (£4/month)
javaexpert
Newbie
Posts: 3
Registered: ‎05-07-2013

Re: Malicious Plusnet Employee Cut Me Off

It was Plusnet, alright. But, yes, I found their lack of professionalism astounding
pwatson
Rising Star
Posts: 2,470
Thanks: 8
Fixes: 1
Registered: ‎26-11-2012

Re: Malicious Plusnet Employee Cut Me Off

Have you checked your email accounts?  It could be that there are several warnings of disconnection sat there already?
It does seem a little unreasonable that the agent hid behind the all encompassing 'Data Protectection' - Giving a general description of an email address (first few characters or the domain name) is hardly a security risk but I suspect the operator training doesn't allow for such flexibility.
I'd take up your complaint with the PlusNet Business account department - You do have a Business account, don't you?
Chris
Legend
Posts: 17,724
Thanks: 600
Fixes: 169
Registered: ‎05-04-2007

Re: Malicious Plusnet Employee Cut Me Off

I've taken a look over the account, your post here and listened to the first call yesterday. I agree with you that the agent who rang you could have been more explicit in what was going to happen to the account, especially as he was ringing the number the broadband is provided on to (so we can verify part of the DPA from that).
Quote
first instalment of a payment plan I agreed to

Yes, this is the reason he called you. I'll speak to that department and get someone to give you a call asap to sort this out.
Former Plusnet Staff member. Posts after 31st Jan 2020 are not on behalf of Plusnet.
javaexpert
Newbie
Posts: 3
Registered: ‎05-07-2013

Re: Malicious Plusnet Employee Cut Me Off

Thanks for your responses, everyone.
My phone line and internet were restored shortly after my first post! I'm not sure if that was down to you, Chris.
Anyway, thanks for taking the time to listen to the call, Chris. I'm sorry to say, that I am pursuing a complaint against the guy who called yesterday; I am completely stunned by what he did and think he should have some supplementary training.
This is what appears to have happened: although I agreed to the instalment plan of £24 a month, this apparently isn't taken by direct debit.  I assumed it would be and I honestly cannot remember being told that I would have to call to make this payment.  I assumed that the £42 direct debit payment plusnet recently took included an instalment as it was a lot higher than my actual tariff (I haven't looked at it yet to see what the extra call charges are).
So when the guy rang the monthly instalment was late - by one day.  As I mentioned before, I didn't know why he was ringing, I saw that Plusnet had already taken a £42 direct debit payment so did not think it was a billing issue (I actually thought it was a sales call), and I thought my instalments were being taken by direct debit.
I have just finish speaking to the complaints department and after it was explained to me about the instalments, I paid the £24 which I thought was being taken automatically.
'pwatson' said: "Have you checked your email accounts?  It could be that there are several warnings of disconnection sat there already?"
No, there were not warnings.  I guess because the payment was a day late (I must emphasize) that I thought it was being taken by direct debit.
adamwalker
Plusnet Help Team
Plusnet Help Team
Posts: 16,871
Thanks: 882
Fixes: 221
Registered: ‎27-04-2007

Re: Malicious Plusnet Employee Cut Me Off

Thanks for your feedback, it sounds like we could have been clearer about the method of payment for that. Just to be clear direct debit is only used for scheduled monthly payments so anything beyond that would need to be a payment from a debit or credit card.
Just to hopefully reassure you in part, one of the main aspects of the roles of the digital care team (i,e myself, Chris, Matt etc) is to make sure that any feedback or opportunities for improvement are pushed back into the business so we'll be keeping that in mind whilst looking into that call and as far as I'm aware feedback has been passed on to the agent concerned already.
Apologies again for any hassle.
Adam
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 Adam Walker
 Plusnet Help Team